Ian Bogost - Water Cooler Games - Missile in the HASTAC

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Water Cooler Games

Water Cooler Games served as the web's primary forum for "videogames with an agenda" — coverage of the uses of video games in advertising, politics, education, and other everyday activities, outside the sphere of entertainment.

The site was maintained at watercoolergames.org from 2003-2009, where it was edited by myself and Gonzalo Frasca. It is now archived here in full.

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Missile in the HASTAC

by Ian Bogost November 19, 2008

categories: Educational Games , Political Games , Social Games

The HASTAC consortium has just announced a forum hosted by their HASTAC Scholars fellows on digital games, entitled Participatory Play: Digital Games From Spacewar! to Virtual Peace to "explore game innovations that surpass violent first-person shooters and military training simulations." Here's a further description:

Beginning with notable exemplars of imaginative game designs, such as "Virtual Peace," we will explore the theoretical and pedagogical issues surrounding video games. Among other topics, we'll consider the relationship between game play and game theory, changing trends in gaming culture, scholarly collaborations on game design, pedagogical uses of video games, and the social, political and cultural implications of online worlds.

Anyone can participate in the conversation by registering at the HASTAC forum.

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